Notes

When will the war in Ukraine end? Russia-Ukraine war News
Russia's Ministry of Defense released a statement on Telegram Wednesday, giving more details on the military plane crash in Belgorod in which it said 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war died, as well as nine other Russians. Ukraine's army separately said it had been targeting and would continue to target military aircraft crossing the border from Russia's Belgorod into Ukrainian Kharkiv following a slew of strikes on the region. "'Facts' is the key word now," he added, saying he had summoned top Ukrainian military and intelligence officials to report on the plane crash. He said he then tasked them with "finding out the fate of all prisoners" and "investigating all the circumstances."


This Swedish Air Force handout image from March 2, 2022, shows Russian fighter jets violating Swedish airspace east of the Swedish Baltic Sea island of Gotland. Ukraine's air defenses have been surprisingly effective against Russia's air force. Still, it’s an open question whether the U.S. will be able to indefinitely continue its current level of support, said Mark Cancian, a CSIS senior adviser who has studied the volumes of artillery used in the war. The United States, as Ukraine’s most important military supporter, remains the center of gravity when it comes to an eventual outcome for the conflict. American leadership has so far been largely united in their support for Kyiv. That’s changed, with Germany now pledging to deliver Leopard 2 battle tanks and approving other countries’ requests to follow suit.

Ukraine suggests Russia failed to provide information on POW route after aircraft downed
China intervenes, putting pressure on Moscow to compromise, warning that it will not buy Russian oil and gas unless it de-escalates. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian authorities see the continuing destruction of their country and conclude that political compromise might be better than such devastating loss of life. Ukraine, say, accepts Russian sovereignty over Crimea and parts of the Donbas. In turn, Putin accepts Ukrainian independence and its right to deepen ties with Europe. But it is not beyond the realms of plausibility that such a scenario could emerge from the wreckage of a bloody conflict. Perhaps more likely is that this develops into a protracted war.

“Russia probably believes that it has the advantage for the time being and is advancing in the Donbas, albeit slowly,” Jamie Shea, a professor of strategy and security at the University of Exeter, told Al Jazeera. Apart from a few exceptions, almost all of the tens of thousands of people who have died in this war have been on Ukrainian territory. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has focussed the West's military minds. But more generally it’s because the underlying dynamic is different from the short war.
Gideon Rachman That was Hein Goemans explaining why he’s interested in war and why he’s gloomy about the prospect that the conflict in Ukraine will end anytime soon. That’s a view shared by many people in the American government. In fact, I was alerted to Professor Goemans’ work by a contact who works in the American government, and he was cited as something that his colleagues had been studying as they tried to see how this war might be brought to a close. Unfortunately, the Ukraine war, as you’ll hear, bears many of the hallmarks of a conflict that’s destined to go on for some time. I began our discussion by asking Hein Goemans to give me an outline of what war termination theory is all about. The city of Bakhmut, which has endured some of the heaviest fighting of the war, has been under Russian control for several months and, although Ukraine gained some ground in the surrounding areas over the summer, the battles continue.

After a year of war in Ukraine, all signs point to more misery with no end in sight
For now, at least, Ukraine's allies are standing firmly beside it, saying they will support it "whatever it takes" while Russia too is "nowhere near giving up," Barrons said. Defense experts say it's unlikely the counteroffensive will see any breakthroughs this year. But they note it's crucial for Ukraine to be able to show at least some gains in order to maintain Western support for the war into 2024 — and perhaps beyond.

He judges that continuing the war may be a greater threat to his leadership than the humiliation of ending it. He was not making a case for conscription or for an imminent call up of volunteers. Army captain who last year became a special adviser to Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the commander of the Ukrainian military. "The discovered black boxes have been handed over to investigators," the source said, RIA Novosti reported.
Trepova said she had gone along with Gestalt's instructions because she assumed the purpose of eavesdropping on Tatarsky was to find out more of what he knew about the war, which she opposed. She told the trial she was acting under orders from a man in Ukraine whom she knew as "Gestalt" (German for "Shape"), who had been sending her money and instructions for several months before the cafe bombing. It said that it did not have "reliable and comprehensive information about who exactly was on board the plane and how many of them."

The costs of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
Over the summer, however, the challenge facing Ukraine's forces was glaringly obvious as they struggled to break through heavily fortified Russian positions and lines of defenses along a swathe of the 600-mile-long front line across the southern and east of the country. In the fall, Azerbaijani forces defeated Armenian troops and recaptured the disputed region of Nagorno Karabakh, three decades after Baku had suffered a military defeat to Armenia. "The Ukrainian leadership was well aware of the impending exchange and was informed of how the prisoners would be delivered," he said during a speech in the State Duma, according to a NBC News translation of his comments.


Separately, Ukraine's armed forces said in a statement that they would continue to "control the airspace to destroy the terrorist threat" of strikes crossing the border from Belgorod into Ukraine's Kherson region. Separately, Ukraine's armed forces said in a statement they would continue to "control the airspace to destroy the terrorist threat" of strikes crossing the border from Belgorod into Ukraine's Kharkiv region. The Head of the Duma Defense Committee Andrei Kartapolov told the RBC news agency that the Ilyushin-76 military transport plane was "shot down by three Patriot or IRIS-T missiles," that had been given to Ukraine's armed forces by its Western allies. Under Article 5 of the military alliance's charter, an attack on one member is an attack on all.


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